I understand the theory but... (Bill don't take it personal, just another
view)
So where does it stop ?
Do we throw out cw as the characters have variable elements per letter ?
Since people seem to struggle with s and h especially in a grouping... do we
not allow s and h combos ?
For an SSB contest do we make people use phonetics that are all the same
number of syllables ?
Do we make everyone have the same type of call ? What would it be 1x2, 2x1,
2x3 ??? Since we can't have section abbreviations that have the same
characters why should callsigns be different (W8AB and W8ABC would not be
allowed) ?
Does everyone have to send their number as 4 digits ? Are you going to
disallow sending shortcuts for numbers (T=0, A=1, N=9, etc), that would make
the numbers be variable length on cw ?
If too many people keep asking me for my section, I assume one of a couple
of things: I am not sufficiently loud, I have reached a new level of QSO's
which are marginal, I am sending it in a way that could be improved, etc.
The bottom line is that by nature a contest has errors. The winners manage
their errors better than anyone else. I don't think it is broken therefore
I don't think it needs to be fixed. The only thing broken is the human and
much of the fun of contesting is pushing ones self to be better and creating
ways to make yourself/station better.
73 Tim K9TM
-----Original Message-----
From: W1HIJCW@aol.com <W1HIJCW@aol.com>
To: cq-contest@contesting.com <cq-contest@contesting.com>
Subject: [CQ-Contest] Sctns, abrviatns, et al
>
>At the risk of becoming too serious -- I'd like to suggest that the
>discussions of logging programs filling in the blanks, etc. are in fact
>missing the point.
>
>Starting with the premise that the intention of the SS exchange is to test
>one's ability to receive and record correctly a sent "message", then one
>issue is that the content of the message, wherever possible, should be as
>unambiguous as it can reasonably be. Clearly the CK is chosen from a set of
>possible 2 digit numbers, so while there is no way of telling what the
number
>should be from the other elements of the message, at least the listener
knows
>that it is 2 digits.
>
>But section abbreviations don't enjoy that luxury. They can be 2 characters
>or 3 characters, and worse there can be two and three character valid
>abbreviations where the first two characters of a three element
abbreviation
>are the same as a valid two element abbreviation (LAX and LA, ORG and OR).
>
>"information science" dictates that if the purpose is accurate information
>transfer, then ambiguity in the message should be eliminated wherever
>possible. So one possible solution:
>
>Make all section abbreviations 3 characters; and
>
>Eliminate the duplication of the first two: LAX is alright, but Louisiana
>becomes LOU, Maine is MNE and Massachusetts is MAS, SCV remains, but
>Sacramento Valley becomes SVY, Michigan is MIC and Mississippi is MSS.
>
>Just a thought ---
>
>73, Bill
>W1HIJ
>
>
>--
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>
>
>
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